MOORESVILLE,
N.C. — Sixty educators from across the nation roamed the halls and ringed the rooms
of East Mooresville Intermediate School, searching for the secret formula. They
found it in Erin Holsinger’s fifth-grade math class.

There,
a boy peering into his school-issued MacBook blitzed through fractions by
himself, determined to reach sixth-grade work by winter. Three desks away, a
girl was struggling with basic multiplication — only 29 percent right, her
screen said — and Ms. Holsinger knelt beside her to assist.

Curiosity
was fed and embarrassment avoided, as teacher connected with student through
emotion far more than Wi-Fi.

As
debate continues over whether schools invest wisely in technology — and whether
it measurably improves student achievement — Mooresville, a modest community
about 20 miles north of Charlotte best known as home to several Nascar teams
and drivers, has quietly emerged as the de facto national model of the digital
school.

The
district’s graduation rate was 91 percent in 2011, up from 80 percent in 2008.
On state tests in reading, math and science, an average of 88 percent of
students across grades and subjects met proficiency standards, compared with 73
percent three years ago. Attendance is up, dropouts are down. Mooresville ranks
100th out of 115 districts in North Carolina in terms of dollars spent per
student — $7,415.89 a year — but it is now third in test scores and second in
graduation rates.

“Other
districts are doing things, but what we see in Mooresville is the whole
package: using the budget, innovating, using data, involvement with the community
and leadership,” said Karen Cator, a former Apple executive who is director of
educational technology for the United States Department of Education. “There
are lessons to be learned.”

Start
with math lessons: each student’s MacBook Air is leased from Apple for $215 a
year, including warranty, for a total of $1 million; an additional $100,000 a
year goes for software. Terry Haas, the district’s chief financial officer,
said the money was freed up through “incredibly tough decisions.”

Sixty-five
jobs were eliminated, including 37 teachers, which resulted in larger class
sizes — in middle schools, it is 30 instead of 18 — but district officials say
they can be more efficiently managed because of the technology. Some costly
items had become obsolete (like computer labs), though getting rid of others
tested the willingness of teachers to embrace the new day: who needs globes in
the age of Google Earth?

Families
pay $50 a year to subsidize computer repairs, though the fee is waived for
those who cannot afford it, about 18 percent of them. Similarly, the district
has negotiated a deal so that those without broadband Internet access can buy
it for $9.99 a month. Mr. Edwards said the technology had helped close racial
performance gaps in a district where 27 percent of the students are minorities
and 40 percent are poor enough to receive free or reduced-price lunches.

(The New York Times. February 13, 2012/adapted)

3. Mooresville educational success is due to the

a) amount of dollars spent with students a year.

b) investments from several private companies.

c) deep wish of minorities to show their potential.

d) set of financial, pedagogic and community actions.

4. In the text, one of the “incredibly tough decisions”
referred to

a) fire teachers.

b) spend 1 million.

c) buy new globes.

d) control attendance.

5. The underlined word in the text refers to

a) formulas.

b) educators.

c) rooms.

d) halls.

“The kitchen table is more than a place for
____________, it’s a place where families meet. But was the ____________ it is
made from harvested sustainably? Used to be hard to tell. Now ____________ can
look for the Forest Stewardship Council ____________ to make sure wooden
furniture is forest friendly.

We should ____________ that the world’s forests are ____________
responsibly so that people and wildlife can continue to exist in the future.”

6. Choose the sequence that completes the text.

a) meals / wood / shoppers / label / ensure / managed

b) fun / seed / buyers / license / prevent / cut

c) talk / peel / sellers / tag / avoid / made

d) argument / tree / representatives / plate / defend
/ sprayed

Introducing
the perfect chemistry between a Green technology and a blue world

There
is a formula for a healthy new world. That’s why Braskem invested millions in
research to become the first company in the world to use Brazilian sugar cane
as a natural plastic source, collaborating with the reduction of the GHG
emissions. Its commitment to a sustainable development resulted in a benchmark
eco-efficient process that stimulates the markets in which Braskem operates and
generates new opportunities.

At age three, Balamurati Krishna Ambati was badly
burned and spent several months in hospital. He decided then that he wanted to
be a doctor. A few years later, he read in the Guinness Book of Records that
the youngest doctor in the world was 18 years old. So he decided to become a
doctor by the age of 17. Many people thought this was impossible, but at 11,
Ambati was in college. He graduated from college at 14 and from medical school
at 17. Now that he is a doctor, Ambati plans to go for advanced training in
Boston.

Catherine
Charlton

Catherine
Charlton is studying engineering at Cornell University, but she has already
achieved an important goal: She has worked for NASA (the National Aeronautics
and Space Administration). Charlton’s achievements aren’t only in engineering,
however. She is also a successful pianist and composer. Charlton hopes to
combine her talents for engineering and music someday. For example, she would
like to design concert halls or manufacture pianos.

Jasmin Sethi

The
Scholastic Aptitude Test is the test American students take to enter college;
each year, only a few students get a perfect score. One of those students was
Jasmin Sethi. Her achievement was especially remarkable because she is blind.
To take the test, someone read the test questions to her, and she gave the
answers. She even solved difficult math problems in her head. Sethi has been
the editor of her school newspaper and has organized food collections. She
wants to go to a top university next year. Sethi

Saturday, May 17, 2014

During the first two months of 2014 a group of
Brazilian English teachers (I was one of them) had the opportunity of taking a
course at St. John´s University in Manhattan, NYC. It was a great, spectacular,
unforgettable experience for all of us because besides learning new teaching
strategies and technologies we could interact a lot with native and foreign
teachers, people on the streets and classmates, changing experiences and
learning new things as well.The university:

St. John´s is a private Roman Catholic University
founded in 1870 with campuses in Manhattan, Queens and Staten Island (New York
City), a graduate center in Oakdale (New York) and also abroad, one in Rome and
another in Paris.

The building where we studied in Manhattan was sold for
$223 million to a partnership between Fisher Brothers and The Whitkoff Group;

The
transaction represents the largest sale in Lower Manhattan, a record price for
the area, according to Cushman & Wakefield, which
represented St. John’s.

Located
on the northeast corner of Murray and West streets, the campus has a 31,028
square-foot footprint and allows for the development of a residential building
totaling 310,028 square feet.

Fisher
Brothers and Witkoff Group said they plan to demolish the property at 101
Murray Street and replace it with a new mixed-use building incorporating
residential and commercial spaces.

"Lower
Manhattan continues to evolve at a record-setting pace and we are proud to be a
part of it, along with The Witkoff Group,”Winston Fisher, partner
at Fisher Brothers, said in a statement.

The
university will continue to occupy the Manhattan campus until mid-2014 and
plans to find another centrally located space in Manhattan before the start of
the 2015 academic year.

“The
university takes great pride in our presence in New York City, and the
overwhelming success of this transaction allows us to ensure the strength of
that presence for generations of St. John’s students to come,” Martha Hirst,
executive vice president, chief operating officer and treasurer at St. John’s University,
said.

Thursday, May 8, 2014

Actress and humanitarian Angelina Jolie Voight was born in Los Angeles,
California, on June 4, 1975. She starred in the HBO biopic Gia before earning
an Academy Award for best supporting actress for Girl, Interrupted. Jolie has
become one of Hollywood’s top marquee names, having starred in movies like Wanted,
Mr. and Mrs. Smith, Salt and Changeling. She’s also directed the film In the
Land of Blood and Honey. In October 2008, Jolie appeared in the Clint Eastwood-directed
thriller Changeling, for which she received an Oscar nomination for best
actress.

She is coupled with actor Brad Pitt and has a big family. Jolie first
adopted Maddox, her first son. Three years later, Jolie adopted a daughter,
Zahara. The couple’s first biological daughter, Shiloh, was born in 2006. In
March 2007, Jolie added a new member to her family, she adopted another boy. In
2008, she gave birth to twins.

A devoted humanitarian, Angelina Jolie was made a Goodwill Ambassador
for the UN Refugee Agency in 2001. She has made headlines for her work to
obtain aid for refugees in Cambodia, Darfur and Jordan, to name just a few. In
2005, Jolie received the Global Humanitarian Action Award from the United Nations
Association of the USA for her activism on behalf of refugee rights.

In May 2013, 37-year-old Jolie announced in a New York Times op-ed
article titled My Medical Choice that she underwent a double mastectomy in an
effort to prevent breast cancer in the future. The actress said she decided to
undergo the surgery after learning that she carries a gene known as BRCA1,
which increases the risk of both breast and ovarian cancer. The news made
headlines all over the world.

2. How many children does Angelina Jolie have,
both adopted and biological?

a) 2

b) 3

c) 4

d) 5

e) 6

Based on the text about Angelina Jolie, assign T (true) or F (false)
to the following statements.

( ) She has made headlines because of her
involvement in sex scandals.

( ) She has more adopted children than
biological ones.

( ) She has recently made public she has
undergone surgery to prevent a disease.

( ) She has won an award in recognition of her
humanitarian activism.

( ) She is known for both her acting career and
humanitarian activism.

3. Choose the alternative that
shows, top-down, the correct sequence.

a) T, T, F, T, F.

b) T, F, T, F, T.

c) F, T, T, F, F.

d) F, T, F, F, T.

e)
F, F, T, T, T.

Read the following book review and answer questions 4 and 5.

The Great Gatsby is probably F. Scott Fitzgerald’s greatest novel, a
book that offers damning and insightful views of the American nouveau riche in
the 1920s. The Great Gatsby is an American classic and a wonderfully evocative
work.

Like much of Fitzgerald’s prose, it is neat and well crafted. Fitzgerald
seems to have had a brilliant understanding of lives that are corrupted by
greed and incredibly sad and unfulfilled. The novel is a product of its
generation with one of American literature’s most powerful characters in the
figure of Jay Gatsby, who is urbane and world-weary. Gatsby is really nothing
more than a man desperate for love.

(Adapted from: The Great Gatsby Review. Source:
.

Accessed on: 14 jul. 2013.)

4. Based on the review, it is correct to assert that

a) The Great Gatsby is
one of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s minor works of prose.

b) The Great Gatsby is
unlike most of Scott Fitzgerald’s prose.

c) the book depicts
the lifestyle of newly wealthy Americans in the 1920s.

d) the novel is
poorly written and shows the lack of writing skills of its author.

e) the novel portrays
a number of powerful characters, except for Jay Gatsby.

5

According to what is stated in the review, consider the following
statements.

I. Fitzgerald shows in his novel an understanding of the corruption greed
can cause.

II. The Great Gatsby portrays lives fulfilled by love and professional
satisfaction.

III. The novel reflects the lifestyle of a generation of American
literature writers.

IV. The main character, Gatsby, represents someone who is in despair for
love.

5. Choose the correct alternative.

a) Only the
statements I and II are correct.

b) Only the
statements I and IV are correct.

c) Only the
statements III and IV are correct.

d) Only the
statements I, II and III are correct.

e) Only the
statements II, III and IV are correct.

Read the
following text and answer questions 6 to 8.

São Paulo, Brazil – Protesters showed up by the
thousands in Brazil’s largest cities on Monday night in a remarkable display of
strength for an agitation that had begun with small protests against bus-fare increases,
then evolved into a broader movement by groups and individuals irate over a
range of issues including the country’s high cost of living and lavish new
stadium project costs.

The growing protests rank among the largest and most
resonant since the nation’s military dictatorship ended in 1985, with
demonstrators numbering into the tens of thousands gathered here in São Paulo, Brazil’s
largest city, and other large protests unfolding in cities like Rio de Janeiro,
Salvador, Curitiba, Belem and Brasília, the capital, where marchers made their
way to the roof of Congress.

Sharing a parallel with the antigovernment protests in
Turkey, the demonstrations in Brazil intensified after a harsh police crackdown
last week stunned many citizens. In images shared widely on social media, the police
here were seen beating unarmed protesters with batons and dispersing crowds by
firing rubber bullets and tear gas into their midst.

“The largest protests are happening in cities which
will host World Cup Games,” said Mr. Malini, a scholar who analyzes data
patterns in social media at the Federal University of Espírito Santo. “Brazilians
are mixing soccer and politics in a way that is new, and minority voices are
making themselves heard.”

(ROMERO, S. Thousands Gather for Protests in Brazil’s
Largest Cities. The New York Times. Source:

Thursday, May 1, 2014

The police in Spain say that they have arrested the
spectator who threw the banana at Barcelona defender Daniel Alves on April 27.

The racist incident happened when the player was going
to take a corner in a match against Villarreal. He responded by peeling the
fruit and eating it and this act received praise and campaigns against racism on
the web all over the world.

The man who was detained has been identified as a 26-year-old
Villarreal supporter named as David Campaya Lleo.

The club said the man involved had had his season
ticket withdrawn and been given a lifetime ban.

Daniel Alves said that it was "not an isolated
incident", and that he had been denouncing racist insults for over six
years.

"I hope that this (campaign) can be an alert to
ban this kind of attitude from football altogether. I hope the debate about
racial prejudice will not fade away, but stays on permanently and not be
restricted only to football," he added.

He criticized Spain saying that they sell the country
as being first world but in certain things they are very backward.

Alves also said that he wanted the opposition fan who
threw the banana to be publicly shamed.

Villarreal said the club deeply regrets and condemns
the incident.

The hashtag "we are all monkeys" took
Twitter by storm after the Brazilian player Neymar tweeted a photo of himself
smiling on Instagram with a banana, side by side with his toddler son.

Professional players, celebrities and ordinary people
have posted photos of themselves, banana in hand, on social media. I am one of
them: see above.